Mugshots, Spaceman Spiff, & Fingerprinting

The first few weeks of classes are in the bag and here are some of the things we've been up to.

Getting To Know You

The first week of classes for students involved meeting new people and getting reacquainted with friends from last year.  During social time students connected and played games or built structures.  We also played a few name games.

Great structure!

Mugshots

With our theme being Operation Identification we started out with 'mug shots' of each of the kids.  The 'smiley' mug shots are now posted in the classrooms.  The serious ones will become a part of their TWIG Police Department file.

Part of the 'Most Wanted' wall in the Penticton classroom.

Spaceman Spiff and the Specimens from Planet Zorg

During our first class we imagined that intrepid Spaceman Spiff had returned from Planet Zorg with intriguing specimens for us to identify!  Students named the specimens and wrote out descriptions.  These were compiled into a Field Guide to Planet Zorg.  This week the challenge was to see if students could correctly identify the specimens.  We discovered that whether a specimen was easy to identify or not was often due to how unique it was and how much detail there was in the description. 

Fingerprints

Fingerprint done with graphite and tape.

We watched two short videos on fingerprints and then we got to work making our own fingerprints.  All of the students got the opportunity to take their fingerprints using graphite and clear tape--these turned out really well!  The Wednesday morning and Thursday afternoon classes also took their fingerprints using ink pads (the other classes will get a chance to do this too.)  In future classes we'll be analyzing our own prints and learning how to take latents. 

Thanks for dropping by to find out what we did... This Week In Gifted!

Start-Up Schedule

Early dismissal has wreaked a bit of havoc with the start-up schedule for Gifted classes.  Normally I do not adjust the schedule due to early dismissal since every elementary school has a different schedule and my students come from a variety of different schools.  For two of the classes though, all but one student had early dismissal on what was to be their first Gifted class.  For those two classes only (Tues pm and Weds pm) I have adjusted the schedule and notified the families. 
So, here is the updated schedule for class start-up:

Tuesday afternoon: AIM/ASPIRE first class October 27th.
Wednesday morning: Penticton grade 5s first class October 21st
Wednesday afternoon: Penticton grade 4s first class October 28th
Thursday afternoon: Penticton 1 - 3s first class October 22nd

	Mon	Tues	Weds	Thurs	Fri
8:45 - 11:40am			Penticton 5s @ Wiltse Elementary
12:30 - 2:30pm		AIM/ASPIRE @ Trout Creek Elementary	Penticton 4s @ Wiltse Elementary	Penticton   1 - 3s @ Wiltse Elementary

   
I keep the calendar with the class schedule on it updated, so if you are ever uncertain about when classes are you can check it out here.

Have a great weekend!

Getting to Know You

Yipee, classes are finally under way!  It was wonderful meeting students who I'd not worked with before and to reconnect with those I already know.  The goals of the first week of classes were to get to know each other, and to start encrypting and decrypting messages.  We also talked about this year's theme; Top Secret Communication!  We will be looking at communication in general, as well as investigating codes and ciphers.  We will also be creating our own virtual radio station.  Students in all the classes had some great ideas for the virtual radio station; I'm really looking forward to that coming together later on in the year.  

For the first part of the year we will be spending time learning about different ciphers and codes.  In week 1 we learned about the Caesar shift cipher (try saying that 10 times fast!)  Students encrypted and decrypted messages using this cipher.  Here's another message to decrypt (it has a Caesar shift of 3--use the alphabet strip below to help you solve it):

Question:  Why didn't the teddy bear eat his lunch? 

Answer:  EHFDXVH KH ZDV VWXIIHG!

I know, it's a groaner.

That's all for now, thanks for checking in.